Uzbekistan

Tashkent

: Area near Chorsu Bazaar

: Chicks sellin’ strawberries

: Local beardo

: Banana broad

: Exterior of Chorsu Bazaar – “Chorsu” being the Persian word for “crossroads.” Also in this photo is a sign that looks like it says “GO SHIT”.

: Chorsu Bazaar interior

: Business as usual

: Makin’ sales

: Ya boi ‘n’ a young Uzbek vender

: Just really good friends?

: Like many ex-Soviet capitals, modern Tashkent has totally unnecessary 8-lane boulevards cutting through the city which are often flanked by monumental structures – the regime’s way of flexin’ they nuts.

: Building near our hotel

: Someone Facebook liked this building

: There are only three rules to enter this government building: No purses, no guns & no soda bottles!

: Exclusive Man: The retail outlet where 4 out of 5 male chauvinists prefer to buy their clothing

: What dat place is?

: The capital city had a lot of these cultural, nationalistic billboards all over the place.

: “O’ZBEKISTON RESPUBLIKASI”

: Try getting longer brooms perhaps?

: Proud Uzbekistanis

: Blue, white and green are the colors of Uzbekistan’s flag.

: Cupcake Boy

: Lot of seemingly outdated rides in the capital city that came in every color you could imagine

: What? You yella?

: Blue balls

: Near Chorsu Bazaar

: The yellow piping in the background there supplies gas to this old residential neighborhood.

: Women walking past the gas lines in the photo previous

: Bros in front of a convenient store

: Super Saloon moblie

: Here’s where the residential neighborhood ended, giving way to Hast Imam Square

: Kids riding bikes in Hast Imam Square

: Tourists & the faithful

: Uzbek girls in school clothing

: Group of Russian tourists

: Kids waving from atop a tree near Hast Imam Square

: I’ve never seen kids poking out of the top of a tree like that. It was actually pretty sweet. Wish I’d thought of that back in the day.

: Fountain inside a mall where I had to stop to take a diarrhea

: Art inside the mall

: Same

: Mannequin legs ready for some stand-up 69 action

: Put a Bieber sticker on this napkin-holder thingy at a restaurant where we ate lunch. He fit right in.

: Statue of Amir Timur

: Timur again with the Soviet-era Hotel Uzbekistan on the left

: Timur from the side. After having visited this statue, I read online that someone stole the horse’s penis. Had I known this beforehand, I would’ve done some investigating and checked it out. From this angle, the thing could either be hidden by the beast’s leg or it could really be a castrated equestrian.

: Government building?

: The hotel receptionist was very attractive, spoke perfect English and was studying to be a lawyer. In spite of this Bieber-inspired love note, I failed to get any stank for my hang-low.

: I encountered this place after I just finished eating a HUGE dinner. Wish I had an appetite to try it out. I mean, this had probably been the only opportunity I’d ever have to try out the Uzbekistani take on Mexican cuisine.

: “BURGER LAND” in a Burger King style logo and “Pizza HOT” which sounds a lot like Pizza Hut but, at the same time, clearly and shamelessly steals Papa John’s “Better Ingredients. Better Pizza.” slogan.

: I got really pissed off then ate a big meal at Angers Food

: Front lawn cockfights in the capital city

: Unlike the cockfights I saw in Manila, these guys didn’t have blades attached to their legs or beaks.

: A big, thick, powerful cock

: “You are now entering the fifth dimension of ascension. Our only intention is to take you high…”

: Difficult to see here, but just outside Tashkent I saw this minivan packed to the max with livestock.

: Petrol

: An exclamation-point-shaped “toilet”

: Massive bird’s nest atop a pole along a highway outside of town

: Woman tending to the field where we stopped off to purchase some fresh strawberries from a stand on the side of the highway.

Bukhara

: 1USD is equal to somewhere around 2100 Uzbek Som. Since the highest denomination of som is the 1000 som bill, the exchange of 100USD results in a George Costanza wallet.

: An Alaskan dude named Leopard flashing his $100 worth of som

: When eating as a group, bills at the restaurant could run as high as the Uzbek equivalent of $400 US dollars. Since the largest bill is only worth fifty cents, it took teams of people to count the 1000s of bills we’d throw on the table to cover the costs. They really need to update their currency.

: Waiter showing off his baby

: Tire store? I don’t know what the hell that is.

: Man meal

: His eyebrows look like squirts of toothpaste.

: Young bro & sis. The kid on the left was playing with a knife.

: Although 90% of Uzbekistan is Muslim, drinking is largely popular. This may be due to the lack of religious fundamentalism in the country paired with a heavy Russian influence.

: Old man next to an old building

: Statue of Nasreddin Hodja which was very popular with the locals

: Heading towards the statue of Nasreddin Hodja

: Mosque or madrasa?

: Stupid me – can’t remember the significance of this face, but it appeared on quite a few Uzbek religious structures and even the currency.

: Warding off evil spirits?

: Mother/Daughter

: Kid

: An Australian dude named Joe riding the Hodja statue as a young Uzbek girl holds his hand

: Floating mosque

: Silk road traveler of old

: Bukhara bicyclist

: Same dude up close

: Mosque men

: Grandmama

: Carpets for sale

: Woman from the photo previous

: Old Soviet gear

: Old school Commie pilot hat

: Me in a fuckin’ General Ourumov hat with Greg, an Australian guy, in the pilot cap.

: Uzbek people chillin’ out

: Who doesn’t seem to fit in here?

: A mum and her boy

: A hard look from cane man

: Domes

: Nice

: “America, fuck yeah!”

: Inside

: A two-sworded ciggie SUCK IT!

: Them domes look like a pair of lobsided titties

: Streetside ceramic sale

: Minaret

: Two Uzbek women who’d just been rescued by Superman watch their hero fade away as he flies off into the distance…

: As much as I’d like to say this shit was real, they were actually filming a movie on location in Bukhara.

: Actors

: Big ass mosque

: Courtyard of what I believe had been Kalon Mosque

: Interior

: Courtyard view from inside the structure shown two photos ago

: Same

: Chinese tourists not caring who they whacked in the face with their tripods as long as they got that perfect photo they were after

: Mo’ actors

: This group of old Uzbek dudes liked to tour the area as a rapidly moving cluster.

: Same guys in a bunch

: Same guys in a line

: Minaret

: Kid resting his feet

: Mom and kid

: Different mom and kid

: Same mom and kid with kid chewing on a bottle top

: Dome

: This fuckin’ truck had trouble passing through one of the narrow alleyways in a residential Bukhara neighborhood.

: Guy wriggling out

: Same dude climbing out

: Stroller full of beer bottles

: Photos of old criminals at Zindon Prison

: More prisoners. Uzbek jail ain’t somewhere you wanna be

: Painting of a trial…methinks

: Photo of a photo being taken

: Old fighters

: Old cig-suckin’ carpet salesman

: Geppetto’s shop

Nurata

: Rural Uzbekistan

: Desert bug

: Mr. Hands

: Yurt camp where I’m told that I, during a $1-bottle-of-vodka-overload induced blackout, had left “looking like WWII.” Apparently I punched the fellow traveler pictured in the stomach, threw a bunch of ceramic tea pots around, peed all over the kitchen, tossed all the chairs on the roof then woke everyone up while screaming slurred & warbled death threats to the camp staff. Cost of damage for the evening $50USD. Memory of another embarrassing blackout as told by disappointed/disgusted people around me: Priceless.

: Yurt life

: Poppies?

: I think signs like this were indicators of what town we were entering. Then again, I’m a stupid American jackass who can read Cyrillic, so I have no idea.

: Ridin’ dat ass

: Another strange sign

: Old tractor

Samarkand

: SAMARQAND

: Yeah!

: Shitty photo of how beds are transported in Samarkand

: Another stolen Burger King logo

: Gur-e Amir – Persian for “Tomb of the King”

: Amir Temur (1336-1405) – The king

: Windows

: Swissy SUCK IT

: Gur-e Amir interior

: Wall design up close

: Women praying and/or weeping at the king’s tomb

: Side of Gur-e Amir

: Leaving Gur-e Amir

: Mural seen on the way to the Registan

: Same mural different view

: The Registan which translates to “sandy place” in Persian

: Ulugh Beg Madrasa built during the Timurid Empire in the 15th century

: Dad and kid posing in front of Tilya-Kori Madrasa

: Different angle of the Registan

: Face and tiger on the Sher-Dor, or “having tigers,” Madrasa as well as the 200 som bill

: Bros

: Inside one of the madrasas

: Ceiling

: The Registan in art

: Just like in Bukhara, another woman with a steaming pot. Again, not sure what this is because I was really drunk while in Uzbekistan, but think it had something to do with warding off evil spirits.

: Yep

: Window

: Man in a “telpek” which looks like an early Jermaine Jackson style afro

: The dome of Sher-Dor madrasa had been under repair.

: Primitive scaffolding – whatever gets the job done

: Family

: The locals loved Joe, were fascinated by his beard and constantly wanted photos with him

: Uh-huh

: At the market

: Not sure what those fruits are

: Another woman selling dat shit

: Man and wife

: The second I saw this man, I needed to photograph him from every angle

: Profile

: It’s the fuckin’ Uzbek Babe Ruth

: “Das good, no?”

: Dude at the market

: At a market, a classic Central Asian unibrow worn proudly, as if it were a badge of honor.

: Bakin’ sweets, stackin’ treats

: Samarkand scene

: Front of Bibi Khanym Mosque

: Side of Bibi Khanym Mosque

: Around it

: Is that entrance up to code?

: Bibi Khanym dome

: Up ahead on the right is the courtyard in front of Bibi Khanym Mosque

: Baby at Bibi

: Can’t recall which mosque this was an entrance to

: Kickin’ it in front of the entrance from the photo previous

: Graves near Shah-I-Zinda necropolis

: Grave

: Muslim girl at the necropolis

: Women at the necropolis

: Facial

: Funny picture of a weightlifter on the right there next to the flag of Uzbekistan

: Donkey cart

: Take that, 5D cinema!!!

: Café Chicago – my home away from home. Just kidding. We went in there and there were only two guys in there playing cards with techno blasting so loud you couldn’t hear yourself think.

: Biggie lyrics on a t-shirt at a supermarket

Khiva

: Strangely placed couch

: BONER JAMZ

: 3 generations of Uzbek women

: Fistful of som. For a few som more

: Telpek salesman

: Trinket saleswoman

: The following ten or so photos are Khiva in art

: Kid crushin’ an ice cream cone

: Souvenirs

: Me gettin’ a tug job from a dude in a telpek

: Woman selling scarves

: On da phone

: Ceiling

: Lady

: Shades dude

: Young man in bizarre outfit

: Art

: Soul brothers

: Shades woman

: Shades woman up close

: Movie rental

: Three similar looking guys

: Couple or daddy/daughter? Maybe both. Who’s yo’ daddy?

: Think this guy was wasted

: Potentially wasted guy up close

: Bike dude

: Sellin’ them greens

: “XOT DOG”

: Seeds and spice and everything nice

: Mosque

: Portrait hanging behind the desk in the lobby of the hotel

: Sewing stuff

: Krazee-Eyez Killa

: Face

: Umbrella kid

: Around Khiva

: SUCK IT

: SUCK THIS

: Souvenir saleslady

: Souvenir makers

: The king

: Fros

: Bizarre artist take on Khiva

: Same

: Outer space minarets

: Another strange one

: Khiva panorama

: Minaret boner and dome balls

Fergana City & Transit to Kyrgyz Border

: Heading towards the Kyrgyz border

: Mountains

: Scenic

: Scenic spot where we stopped off for a bit

: Photo of a photo being taken

: “Smile fo’ me daddy, let me see ya grill…” Mouf full uh dat Uzbek gold – Grills are unbelievably common in Central Asia and relatively cheap as well with one estimate putting them at approx. $150 per tooth. I almost can’t afford to NOT trick out my smile while I’m up in this bitch

: Another Uzbek man

: Looks like shes dancin’

: Group photo

: Hello

: Woman

: Kid with balloons

: Another gold grill

: Modern family

: “A pleasure stay”

: Kids

: Radio set-up in a silk shop

: Silk girls

: Kid in the street

: Butcher shop

: Group SUCK IT

: Never seen a kid so happy to be wearing a cowboy hat

: Giant teapot near the Kyrgyz border